James Randi Exposes Uri Geller and Peter Popoff

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James Randi Exposes Uri Geller and Peter Popoff

Since we're on a bit of a James Randi kick, I thought I'd post this small 14 minute long retrospective of some of his greater exposes: namely, his complete destruction of spoon-bending Israeli "psychic" Uri Geller and fraud faith-healer Peter Popoff, who has scammed millions of dollars out of terminally ill people from the early-80's until today.

Uri Geller's a bit of a scumbag, but Popoff takes the cake. He preached a prosperity theology, claiming that when money was donated to his church, God would make a "divine transfer" into that person's "divine account". He invited terminally ill people to visit his church and fill out prayer cards. When he was on the air, his wife read these prayer cards to him over a hidden earpiece, which allowed Popoff to appear like he had remarkable psychic insight into random audience members. Randi exposed Popoff definitively by picking up the radio transmissions between Popoff and his wife and overlaying them on a video if Popoff's performances.

Randi's personality doesn't exactly make him likable to everyone: Randi's my hero, but I myself sometimes arch my eyebrow when he cynically tries to destroy people's religious faith. There's nothing wrong with people taking comfort in faith: it doesn't make them stupid or ignorant. There's only something wrong with people trying to take advantage of people who have faith. Randi's at his best when he exposes those who prey upon the faithful, taking the medicine money from the dying to buy themselves a new car. It's services like that which cause me to love Randi, even though I don't always like him.